


The Cricket and the Dragon

by nothingeverlost



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-21
Updated: 2014-05-22
Packaged: 2018-01-26 01:08:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1669115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothingeverlost/pseuds/nothingeverlost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Scenes in no particular order of a relationship between Archie and Gold</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Puppets

"It was supposed to be your parents," Gold commented when a trip to retrieve holiday decorations led them to the basement where the puppets had been banished. Gold had placed them carefully on a shelf in the farthest corner after he’d caught Archie staring at them. It wasn’t possible to bring them back, he’d explained. Magic had a price, and to turn them human would not erase the passing years. It would be cruel to give Geppetto his parents when they would have only days, at best, before their bones turned to dust.

"Why them?" Archie looked guiltily at the puppets. He still carried the weight of what he’d done.  
"Do you think a man or woman came through the door of Rumpelstiltskin’s castle without him knowing about them? I knew what they were. What they’d done. Children should be protected by their parents, not used." Gold’s eyes narrowed at memories that were decades old. He knew how to see a desperate soul, and the man who had been used so vilely by his parents was as desperate as they came.

"You speak about yourself almost as if you were a different person." Archie picked through the boxes and found two labeled Christmas. He didn’t ask another question despite the long pause.

"The man that I became lost me everything I ever wanted. Sometimes I wish I could believe he was a different man." His son was dead. Belle lived, but Zelena’s curse, though defeated, had changed things. Tiny moments that never happened, or happened differently. Minor choices that had changed the details of their lives. He’d never asked for Belle to be his price. She’d never loved him.

His curse was to remember what had been and what was now. 

His small gifts were the child who gladly called him grandpa and the man that listened to him without judgement. And somehow still cared for him despite everything he knew.

"The man you were cared about his son more than anything, and that’s something that was never true of my parents."

"I could say the same of my father." Archie’s parents had kept him too close. His own father had rejected a small boy. And the sons had been forever changed.

"But they’re all gone now. And we’re here." Archie picked up a box and nodded towards the other. "And it’s Christmas. We need to get this stuff up and we need to go buy three stockings."

"Three?" Gold asked.

"Pongo needs a place for his new bone."

"You spoil that dog," Gold said with a snort. Never mind that he was the one who had amassed a whole box of dog toys, already wrapped and ready to go under the tree. And a new collar and leash. And a new dog bed.


	2. Sunshine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was just a nap.

Gold blamed it on the sun. The damn thing was so bright and he’d forgotten his sun glasses. After the food was gone and Henry was chasing Pongo Gold had given up squinting and closed his eyes completely. It was easy to forget where he was with his eyes closed and the warmth attempting to lull him into sleep.

He’d gotten far to used to touching Archie while he slept.

He wasn’t used to a wet dog spraying him with water, or a grandson who looked amused to be on the receiving end of a glare. He looked so much like his father that it sent a twinge of pain to his heart. ”I would hope one of your mothers at least would teach you it’s bad manners to stare. And what did you do to your clothes?”

"Pongo and I fell into the pond, but it’s okay, we got Archie’s umbrella back." The boy plopped down on the grass next to the blanket where Archie still slept. "My gramps does that too, you know."

"Does what?" Gold reached up to straighten his tie before remembering that he wasn’t wearing one. Archie and henry had both admonished him to dress ‘casually’ for their outing. For him that had meant forgoing his tie.

"Curls up behind grams when they’re sleeping. I didn’t know you did it too."

"it was just a nap. The sun. Archie and I…"

"You don’t have to tell me. I got really good at watching and finding clues after I got the book. I know things.” Henry grinned. ”It would be okay to touch him when other people are around. I think he’d like it.”

"Proof that the cricket tamed the dragon?" Gold quipped.

The boy shook his head. ”He’s not used to people caring about him either. Sometimes we need to be reminded, you know.”

"I know." Gold looked behind him where the red headed man slept. And then back to his grandson, who was smiling at him.


	3. Spring Cleaning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The place needed airing out.

"Dustrags and polish, Archie. That’s what spring cleaning is supposed to be about. Or washing the windows and pulling out the shelves to clean behind," Gold grumbled as he looked around the storeroom that was not as full as it had been this morning.

"There’s more than one way to clean the air. Don’t you feel better?" Archie had asked the first question innocently enough, but once he’d realized who the steins belonged to he’d insisted they take them to Leroy and his brothers. Without demanding payment. After that he’d asked so many questions that nothing in the show was safe. They’d made six trips out in the car to visit eleven homes, the items that had been in Gold’s keeping for decades now were back with the people they’d belonged to originally.

"I feel exhausted. And poorer. And the place still needs a good cleaning."

"I’ll come back and help tomorrow," Archie promised.

"No you will not." Gold nudged Archie’s shoulders until he was facing the door. "I can’t afford it."

"Consider it payment for the massage I’ll give you when we get home?" Pongo waited in the yard for them, getting up to greet them both with a wag of his tail and a lolling tongue.

"It better be some massage." Though that didn’t seem like a bad idea right now. Especially if he could talk Archie into a massage that included spending the night.


End file.
